Wildlife/FreeLiving Animals
Updates on Wolves, Whales, and Dolphins: The Hunts Go On
Published September 10, 2009 @ 06:31AM PT
In Japan's village of Taiji, the rounding up of dolphins and shipping them to aquariums, to live the rest of their lives in unnatural, miserable captivity, has begun. The killing of pilot whales has begun. Whether and when the killing of dolphins right there in the cove will resume is yet to be seen. Read more here. (See last related post on this blog here.)
The district judge out in Montana who had the power to stop the wolf hunts underway in Idaho and set to begin next week in Montana passed up the chance: He acknowledged that environmental/wildlife groups may be right that the wolves shouldn't have been delisted, but has ruled that the hunts can go on while the painfully slow process of enviro/wildlife groups suing the government over the delisting continues. Read more here. (See last related posts on this blog here and here.)
Oh--and tens of millions of land animals will be killed for food today, 20,000 every minute, just in U.S. slaughterhouses alone, along with the killing of a mind-boggling number of aquatic animals. There's no failed injunction or grand-scale outrage or media frenzy to report on in relation to those equally tragic deaths because people aren't as horrified by the killing of pigs and cows as they are by the killing of dolphins or as disgusted by the terrorizing of chickens as they are by the hunting of wolves, so this isn't exactly news. But while we're noting the day's bad news for animals, it seems wrong to leave out the ones being killed so casually en masse, who are the same as dolphins and wolves in all the ways that matter.
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Photo of dolphin in Texas aquarium by Flickr user See1,Do1,Teach1
The Tortoise at Woodstock
Published September 09, 2009 @ 03:14PM PT
Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary has a new temporary resident. Check out his adorableness (short story below the video):
From Woodstock:
Ciyalana or "Ciya" (pronounced See Ya!) is a 20 pound African Spurred Tortoise who was abandoned in a NYC park about 4 years ago. He is estimated to be 11 years old, with a life expectancy of 70-80 years! Why is a non-farm animal here at the Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary? His permanent home, the Lower East Side Ecology Center in Manhattan, is undergoing major renovations over the next year, and we've agreed to provide a loving foster home for this little guy in the meantime.
1 of Only 3 Wolf Pairs Killed in Oregon -- For Ranchers, For Us
Published September 08, 2009 @ 07:10AM PT
Some may remember a short post from May titled "Worst Case for Wolves -- And How You May Be Playing a Part." It concluded,
But while we're expressing our outrage at the citizens itching to pull the triggers and the politicians who are allowing it, let's not forget, friends--why is everyone so eager to shoot and kill wolves? For the benefit of ranchers -- and by extension, the benefit of those who eat and wear animals and what comes from them. The killing of wildlife, the further endangerment of endangered species, the destruction and pollution of habitat, the eating and wearing of animals (from the flesh of a cow to the wool of a sheep): it is all connected.
It's worth repeating now that the hunting of wolves is happening in Idaho, now that the hunting of wolves in Montana is just days away, and now that we have this news from the Center for Biological Diversity about the killing of a wolf pair in Oregon, courtesy of the USDA's Wildlife Services -- in a state where there were only three wolf pairs to begin with. The crime committed by these two wolves? Trying to survive, by killing the animals we wanted (but don't need) to kill for ourselves. They killed "livestock" three months ago. So they had to be gunned down. Not because they were doing something unnatural or evil, but because we set up shop in their habitat and because we want to kill and eat and wear sheep and lambs and cows.
All. Connected.
Further reading (off-site): The USDA's War on Wildlife
See also "Gov't Employees Kill Mountain Lions for Sport, Gov't Fires Whistleblower," related to the mass killing of wildlife by the government for animal agribusiness.
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Photo: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Vulture Awareness and Appreciation
Published September 07, 2009 @ 08:43AM PT
There are some animals who just don't get very good press--or who don't get it very often. The vulture is an example. But Saturday, apparently, was International Vulture Awareness Day, I've learned from Becci of Liberation BC. Becci explains,
Vultures are finally getting the respect they deserve after years of being viewed as a creepy symbol of death and decay. Of course, their unsavoury scavenging habits are actually an important part of a healthy ecology; without them, corpses are left to rot and infections are more easily spread.
Read more from Becci here and from a post at 10,000 Birds here (h/t to Advocacy for Animals for the latter link).
The Hunting of Wolves and the Fight to Stop It
Published September 02, 2009 @ 06:37AM PT
Hunting wolves hasn't been legal in the contiguous United States in decades. That changed yesterday, when it became legal to kill wolves in Idaho as a result of the wolves' inappropriate delisting. Organizations such as NRDC, Defenders of Wildlife, and Earthjustice are fighting to stop it--and to stop the hunting of wolves in Montana too as of September 15--but it's up to the court at this point. I appreciate the way a New York Times editorial opposing the hunt ended yesterday:
To us, the wolf hunt in Idaho and Montana seems indecent. Hunters want to kill wolves because wolves kill elk — and the human hunters want the elk. A second reason is a love of killing things. A third is an implacable, and unjustified, hostility to the wolf. It is well past time to let gray wolves find their own balance in the Rockies.
Precisely.
And for an insider's look at what's happening in the legal arena as nonprofits present their solid arguments and fight to stop the killings, see "Wolf Delisting Court Battle 2.0" from NRDC's Switchboard. Here is one frustrating (but telling) relay of information, from outside the courtroom:
Whales and Wool: Celebrating Some Animals at the Expense of Others
Published August 27, 2009 @ 06:58AM PT
Whales fall into the category of animals whom almost everyone professes to love--they're beautiful, they're inspiring, they're grand, we say. And we are right to admire, respect, and want to save whales, but when we exploit and harm one set of animals to call attention to our harm to another set, I call irony. The players this time? Whales, sheep, and art.
Will Eating Less Meat Help Stop Climate Change? YES.
Published August 25, 2009 @ 05:50AM PT
Note: Michael submitted this post in response to a recent post and discussion at the Stop Global Warming blog. As I've noted on this blog before, global warming/climate change is an animal rights issue. Animal advocates oppose animal agriculture for ethical reasons, but it is also a major contributor to greenhouse gases, deforestation, habitat loss, pollution, and more--all of which endangers, harms, and kills even more animals. Free-living animals (aka wildlife) are, and will continue, dying off at alarming rates because of climate change and other environmental problems to which animal ag contributes significantly. Killing animals is killing more animals. Finally, I find Michael's arguments (including his numbers) compelling and am glad to present them here. -S. Ernst
Between the deliberate misinformation spread by folks like David Martosko of the Center for Consumer Freedom and the well-intentioned but incorrect claims made by some environmentalists, there is a lot of confusion about something that, frankly, there is no valid debate about.
The worst effects of global warming will not be effectively prevented without a significant reduction in animal product consumption. Period.
I will counter the two most common arguments I hear about this, and I hope the numbers and statistics are not overwhelming. If you are unfamiliar with the concepts of greenhouse gases, climate change, and CO2/CO2 equivalent, please read the Wikipedia article on global warming.
